


Bright Eyes

by dave_sprite



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-24
Updated: 2012-07-24
Packaged: 2017-11-10 15:36:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/467900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dave_sprite/pseuds/dave_sprite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He tastes like broken glass and tears, and it suits you just fine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bright Eyes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kimoi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimoi/gifts).



> this is my first written contribution to the homestuck fandom omfg here we go!! ! !  
> i'm sorry it isn't dirkroxy i can't write roxy as well as you can gomen

"This — you know — we're not working."

You're not looking at her, you weren't from the moment you walked into the coffee shop, but you know that cadence, and you recognize the implications behind it, and suddenly you feel like you ate lead and your world is falling apart in bitter slices of green and broken smiles.

You put down your coffee cup, trace the rim with your index finger and wonder how it got so chipped. People mill around you, buy pastries, drink terrible coffee, laugh. You don't quite meet Jade's eyes over the top of your shades, and tell her in not so many words that she's being ugly.

She doesn't take it the wrong way, smiles and leans against the window and her breath leaves little white puffs on the glass that make you want to break it, but you don't. Your hands are still and white, cold on the cheap tabletop this little coffeeshop has stuck in the back corner because no one ever sits at it but you and Jade, and not even that anymore.

She touches your shoulder and leaves, and you stay there until your coffee gets cold and you feel your eyes start to burn.

You take the long way home, not because you want to think about love and life and deep, philosophical things, but because you want to go through the park and touch the trunks of the oldest trees and pick roses with the thorns still on and feel your heartbeat thud in time with every crow's call. The park inspector catches you with an armful of roses half an hour later, and you get kicked out with the promise of being turned in if you ever come back.

When you let yourself into your apartment it's cold and something's off, and you realize she already emptied her things out when you notice that her pack of rubber bands isn't on your turntables and that every picture you had with you two in it is gone. You carefully turn the hollow frames around, push them face down, and pinch the bridge of your nose when you realize the rice cooker was hers and it's gone.  
  
Your name is Dave Strider, and you are finally alone.

You wake up the next morning on the futon in the living room and don't remember how you got there, and you suck away the bitter taste in your mouth. You think about asking Jade to bring you breakfast, but then you remember that she isn't there and

oh

yes.

That.

You squeeze your eyes shut and take off your shades, setting them on the floor and stepping over them. You make yourself tea, and try not to think about cashmere sweaters patterned with dogs and frizzy black hair that never stays in one place and odd accents that fit tan bodies perfectly.

You think about pink and blue and green wrapped around thin fingers, and you think about how she'd put her hands on her hips when she was angry, and she was almost always angry because you would take her out for Thai food and she always hated Thai food, but you did it because she was so cute when her face would get red.

You wonder if it was the Thai food that messed everything up, and think that maybe you're making this a little more grandiose than necessary.

You think maybe you should stop thinking, and then you think about the things that people do to forget.

\--

The air in the club is heavy, hot, and being there you wish you'd stayed home, but you stand there behind the turntables because you don't have a choice. Somewhere in the room, a young couple is falling in love and a younger boy cries in the bathrooms and the bartender looks at a lone girl dancing with an odd look on his face, and you see it all. You feel the dull ache in your chest, the hollow pounding of the beats that spill effortlessly from your fingers and you think maybe a few people in the crowd gave you subdued looks, like they know what's happening in your head like they _understand_.

They don't.

Eventually you give up on trying to make music and loop samples, weaving your way through guys wearing practically nothing and girls with legs up to there, and that's where you see her.

Short black hair, cropped in awkward places and pallid skin that almost makes her look ill and a slender frame that looks like it could break in the slightest hint of wind, and she looks at you and her eyes are bled right through and you wonder where your heart went.

“Hey,” you say, and your voice is low and far too steady and you wonder if she even heard you, but then she smiles widely, and her teeth are so, so, sharp, and you feel them cutting into your heart.

“Hey, coolkid.”

You hold out your hand and she takes it, and the music thrums thrums thrums, deep and pulsing but you dance, slow and close, bodies pressed together and her forehead brushing your chest.

\--

She has someone.

She tells you that, teeth glinting as she leers, and you wonder if the empty look in her eyes is your imagination.

You shrug, and thrust into her again, and her nails sink into the ridge of your shoulderblades. You pull her close, heart pounding forever against hers and you swear you see stars when you come. She makes a soft noise, one that sounds like a laugh, and holds you tight.

She tells you her name is Terezi, and that she’s blind. You nod almost imperceptibly, and she traces patterns of carnage and suns into your arm. You feel them burn even after she’s gone, leaving behind nothing but a slip of paper with her number on it. 

You think that even if she’s blind, you know she can see everything far better than everyone else. 

\-- 

They’re taking the cafe’s corner table down, the lady behind the counter tells you with a sad look. No one even sits there anymore. You wonder if she knows why, decide she does, and thank her kindly, dropping a tip in the jar. Terezi sets her fingers on your arm gently. You say nothing to her.

A minute later, strolling out of the cafe, she tells you she’s broken it off with her boyfriend.

You laugh hollowly and leave her there, with an ugly glint in her eyes and all the confidence in the world and just a little bit of bitterness, because she’s blind and knows exactly where you went and why you went.

That night you find Feferi and Eridan and it’s a sad night for you, because you think you’re really losing it when you look at them and think you might want to fit yourself in like a broken puzzle piece. Eridan bites and Feferi’s skin is clammy and you find yourself sandwiched between them and it’s all so perfect.

It really isn’t.

You wake up the next morning covered in wine and something else and throw the covers out, feeling like you could get used to this pain. Like you could really enjoy it.

You don’t drink again for a while.

You bar hop after that, swigging ginger ale and touching everyone and nuzzling the cheeks of the girls with the darkest hair, and they flush, cup your face and it’s a little-

Well. You know.

Next thing - you’re in bed with Gamzee.

Gamzee’s wild and has teeth like jagged glass and a voice to match and hair that gets everywhere, and you think you’d usually be afraid of him, but when you kiss him he melts a little and turns into someone weaker than you, someone frightened of the world and people and disappointments that leave a dull, empty ache in your stomach when you stroke him. He kisses like a puppy, sometimes crazed and sometimes sweet, and you can’t decide on whether you despise him or not.

Terezi tells you you’re on the fast track to misery like this.

You tell her to fuck off, and she kisses your palm.

In the space of three weeks in November you sleep with both of the Captor twins and Terezi has to pay you fifty dollars, licking her teeth nervously. You spend it on apple juice and condoms that you both use, but it’s really about the satisfaction and nothing else.

Here’s how it happens-

You see Tavros in the window of the coffee shop one day, and he’s drinking hot chocolate and watching the cold breeze waft brightly colored leaves across the street.

He has a sad smile and tapered, thin fingers, so you sit down and talk about the weather and flowers.

You meet every day there for a week, and it almost feels real.

Almost.

“I hear Jade moved in with someone,” he says softly on the eighth day.

You think about physics papers scattered across the tables over scratched records and tape decks, and a pink kettle covered in garish flowers that you loved so much.

You think about how Tavros and Jade used to - not date, but he would touch her hands and give her big, moony eyes try to act confident and once he got her chocolates but she laughed and threw them in the bin.

You think about sharp features and how Tavros might kiss like she does, soft and warm like the world is ending beneath your feet.

The walk to his apartment is slow, unhurried, and the moment you’re through the door you grab his shoulders and press your lips to his and it’s all so wonderful.

There are pictures in his bedroom and you recognize some of the people, and some you don’t. He’s fucking you hard, and you stop seeing at all when you feel him come inside of you. 

You’re stuck imagining green eyes instead of muddy brown.

When you leave his room there’s a slender girl cross-legged in the sitting room, long black hair swept over her shoulder and lip curled.  
“Asshole,” she tells you quietly, and in the next minute you’ve got her legs around your waist and you feel so ugly.

After that you kiss her sweet and tender and feel wrong, and a little dirty, so you leave and go to buy some flowers instead of stealing them, and you think that maybe they smell like hope and dreams and freedom, but they don’t. They smell like flowers and dirt. 

One of the photos is smashed on the ground and Tavros turns you away gently, his lip trembling and you want nothing more than to cradle his face because he was the first and only person to ever think you were cool, and now he doesn’t. 

You float. 

Nothingness beckons you and you float in it aimlessly, touching arms and legs and other places hoping it will ground you.

You ask yourself why you fell in love with Jade, and you can’t come up with answers right away, and in the end you convince yourself it’s because of the way she said _Dave_ and touched your hand and kissed your knuckles after you two had sex, like she was sorry for hurting you when she didn’t do a thing. 

One morning you open your eyes and realize there’s a familiar shock of black hair and ivory skin in bed next to you, and there’s something in your throat that tastes like hope and bile, but then you open your eyes and it's John. 

John is a little something like untouchable, soft and warm, his big eyes dewy and deep-set against the rest of his face. You decide he is broken too, and roll over to face him. You touch his cheek. 

“Good morning.” God, you sound like you chewed asphalt. 

“Hello,” he whispers and it’s like you’re meeting him all over again, like he’s not Jade’s twin brother and off-limits. 

So you kiss him. 

You don’t remember the events of last night, but you remember kissing him, and it is slow and unhurried, arms tangling around each other and unspoken promises floating between them. 

You break away. He’s radiating a sort of quiet warmth, the same kind Tavros had before you broke him, and it makes you want to cry and bury your face in his shoulder. 

“Jade misses you.” 

“No, she doesn’t.” You hate how earnest you sound, how sure of yourself, because you want your heart to betray you and allow you a little hope, but then you realize that most of your heart is scattered in living rooms and bedrooms across the city and that you might as well not have one. 

“She does,” he whispers, and kisses you again and your stomach lurches. 

“I don’t give forty flying fucks about her,” you mumble into his mouth, and pull him on top of you. He’s so soft. So sweet. So perfect. 

You tell Terezi, and she just gives you an odd look, kisses your cheek. 

TG: what the fuck is wrong with me  
TT: You’re on a steep downward spiral, Dave.  
TT: Might I suggest counseling? That which I would be delighted to offer.

\-- turntechGodhead  [TG]  blocked tentacleTherapist  [TT]  at 00:24 --

You never speak of Jade between the two of you, and you slowly come to realize that the silences that stretch between your lips are far more familiar and comfortable than the ones you had with her. You hold his hand, nuzzle his cheek. He, in return, gives you soft, apologetic kisses and cries out when you two are connected, sinking his nails into your shoulderblades.

You think that maybe this is what you were looking for the whole time, this easy banter and exchange of secret smiles and the fright of stepping inside your apartment every day just in case a bucket of cooked noodles falls on you.

You think that you are finally happy.

\--

“Dave,” she greets you when you two cross paths on the street and your arm is around John’s waist, and you think you can see her jaw tighten as her fingers curl around the hand of the boy next to her. Your stomach lurches. You recognize him from pictures and long-winded descriptions, and you feel a rush of remorse for not staying with Terezi when she needed you, or maybe the remorse is for this boy with the heavy-lidded eyes, because he was the one who was broken in the end.

“It’s great to see you’re doing well,” she says, and her mouth makes a perfect little O, like she really is happy to see you with her twin brother.

Your jaw clenches and you push her, hard, into the bushes, and even though Karkat is shouting and John is sniggering, you don’t care that you’re acting like a child. You don’t care.

She pulls you down with her, but you don’t kiss. Not this time.

\--

You wake up the next morning to John kissing your cheek and telling you breakfast is ready softly, his eyes clouded over, and you stop

breathe breathe breathe

look at your hands

and roll out of bed, promptly vomiting the contents of your stomach into John’s backpack.

He doesn’t tell you off for it, but you think that yes. This is rock bottom.

\--

You end up in your sister’s home, looking into the flames in the hearth and hoping you become one of them.

“I think I’m in a downward spiral,” you say, mostly because she will understand.

“I know that,” she says stoutly and thrusts a plate of biscuits at you. “That’s what I said.”

“I think I’m at the _end_ of my downward spiral.”

Because-

You think about people, and how twisted they are, and how you can only remember half their names and how none of them kiss you in the middle of a park where no one is watching and how only one of them touches your hand in the middle of the night, sapphire eyes looking at your heart and not your flaws.

You think about the girl from long ago, with the bright eyes and the sacrifices.

Rose nods, an angel in lavender and your sister in things like disappointments and downward spirals.

“Nowhere to go but up, then.”

**Author's Note:**

> here is my [tumblr](http://eridanampora.tumblr.com) if you want it ahhh fjdkf


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